Intermediaries as drivers of innovation development in resource-constrained environments: Insights from the Kenyan water sector

Abstract

Innovations as a solution for sustainability and development challenges are increasingly attracting the attention of academia and practitioners, and collaboration between different actors is seen as a requirement for successful innovation development. In this article, we study innovation intermediaries in resource-constrained environments through a case study of the Kenyan water sector. To understand how intermediaries operate in these environments, we developed an analytical framework to identify the key functions offered by intermediaries at different stages of the innovation process. We identified three intermediary dimensions, recognising that most of the studied intermediaries provide support for the commercialisation of innovations, while far fewer focus on the earlier stages of the process, which hinders the systematic tackling of constraints. However, due to the intermediaries’ past involvement with institutional development, capacity building and overall regional development, they can efficiently mitigate the prevailing constraints and institutional voids. Further, we found that the intermediaries function as hybrid organisations as they adopt new roles and combine different operational logics to support innovators in addition to their more traditional roles in the development sector. Innovation intermediaries thus play a significant role in enabling innovation and sustainable development in resource-constrained environments.